For some reason the great streets of famous cities are almost always a depressing experience. 

The original wording of the 1916 Proclamation of the Irish Republic guarantees fundamental rights and promises to “cherish all the children of the nation equally”.

We look at the timeline of events during Easter Week in 1916.

Amid the myriad of events surrounding the 1916 Rising a narrative has developed about the key drivers of change in Irish society. That, understandably, has focused on the role of culture, labour, sport and women as agents of change behind the formation of the Irish Republic 100 years ago.

Ellen O’Malley Dunlop asks what Constance Markievicz or Dr Kathleen Lynn would make of the position of women in the republic they helped win, and says we’ve lots of work to do yet

Anti-Treaty leader’s personal steel was cloaked by his inoffensive character, writes Conor McNamara

When Eleanor Burke eventually asked her grandmother why she never spoke about her membership of Cumann na mBan in Kerry, Ellie Rice replied: “We learned not to speak or say anything because one idle word during that period could cause somebody’s death.”

This cricket bat was on display in the front window of Elvery’s when it became an early casualty of the violence that erupted in Dublin’s Sackville St, now O’Connell St, on Easter Monday, 1916.

ÉAMONN CEANNT is, in many ways, the ‘unknown’ man among the leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising, and the signatories to the proclamation of the Irish Republic.

President Michael D Higgins led the nation in memory of those who died in overseas service and on UN missions.

In the run-up to celebrating 100 years as an independent country, there will be many debates about how to mark the progress achieved by our Republic, writes Joe Gill.

On the 70th anniversary of US president Franklin D Roosevelt’s death, Ryle Dwyer examines how Éamon de Valera’s fulsome condolence gesture stunned critics

It is lamentable that the Irish Defence Forces, who perceive themselves committed to the defence of our country, to liberal democracy, and to the rule of law (in times of crisis ) insist that they are descended from Oglaigh na hEireann — the group that staged the 1916 insurrection.

I struggle to write a letter about the Easter Rising of 1916, because I am overawed when I consider the profound sacrifice those visionaries made, in offering up their very lives for Irish freedom.

Will other EU nations not help a small, fellow state being bullied? The Irish Republic deserves that support.

The Irish Republic distinguished itself for 40 years with an all-party consensus that paramilitary violence, north and south of the Ulster border, was anathema.

Pádraig Pearse’s pioneering morse code announcement, Twink in lingerie on the Late Late and Miley getting it on with Fidelma in Glenroe feature in Dave Kenny’s magic moments of Irish broadcasting.

The President has taken part in the Easter Rising commemoration in Dublin, where he was joined by the Taoiseach and the Minister for Justice.

The President is to lay a wreath outside Dublin's GPO today honouring those who gave their lives in the Easter Rising.

Sinn Féin has published new legislation seeking to establish a special holiday to commemorate the men and women who died in pursuit of an independent Irish Republic.

Ninety four years ago to this day Dáil Éireann sat for the first time in the Mansion House, Dublin, with the Declaration of Independence adopted.

For the first time in more than a decade the anniversary of the ending of the Great War will coincide with Remembrance Sunday, a day on which millions gather in Britain and on the continent to pay homage to those who died in the “war to end all wars”.

The former head of the Irish Republic’s forensic state laboratory has said he is surprised no-one was ever prosecuted for the IRA killing of 18 British soldiers.

Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams has today rejected calls for the Irish Government to apologise for the emergence of the IRA in the 1970s.

The North’s First Minister has tonight called on the Irish Government to apologise for its role in the emergence of the IRA in the 1970s.

TAOISEACH Enda Kenny’s speech on the Cloyne report was “forthright, honest” and “long overdue”, according to one of the people who wrote to praise him in the wake of the event.

SO, are you going to vote for the little guy, or the even littler guy?

Former senator Eoghan Harris was spat at by an angry protestor yesterday after he denounced

I AGREE with Richard Powers (Letters, June 22) that Pat Cox should be the next president of this country.

The Northern Ireland Assembly could take the power to set corporation tax as part of a consultation on helping the private sector grow.

SHAKY, very shaky.

IN recent years the Government and society in the Republic have been bombarded ad nauseam by those campaigning for state recognition of those Irish in British uniform who died on the poppy fields of France.

I AM writing on behalf of the members of the 1916-1921 Club whose main objective is to honour and remember the dead who fought for Irish freedom and all those who worked for the same cause.

A Church of Ireland bishop claimed today that private school funding cuts were making the Irish Republic a hostile place for Protestant children.

The Government considered sinking the historic Asgard yacht at sea after buying it as an icon of the State’s foundation, official files reveal.

NEXT week marks 90 years since the election of the first Irish woman to parliament — Countess Constance Markievicz.

EACH Easter the Proclamation of the Irish Republic is read with great solemnity at the 1916 commemoration.

A senior Irish Government minister today welcomed the United States’ Government’s dramatic u-turn on a roadmap for dealing with climate change.

The conflict in Darfur in western Sudan remains a “huge source of concern” to both the Irish and UK governments, Foreign Secretary David Miliband said today.

A delegation of US Congressmen visiting the North have been urged to keep pressure on the IRA to dismantle its structures, it emerged today.

Sinn Féin’s move to support the police in the North leaves unionists with no excuse to balk at power-sharing, NI Secretary Peter Hain insisted today.